Million dollar men

Two MEA-MFT members at the University of Montana Western in Dillon might be on the verge of finding a cure for certain yeast infections and Lyme disease.

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) recently funded Biology Professors Mike Morrow and Mike Gilbert for their biomedical research. Each professor will bring in $507,375, for a total of over $1 million, to UM Western over the next five years.

“It is extremely rare for a school of our size to have two NIH funded researchers with over $1 million in funding,” Gilbert said.
Morrow, along with several lab students, is researching protein trafficking in the pathogenic yeast Candida albicans in an attempt to combat a number of types of yeast infections.

Gilbert’s research lab focuses on Borrelia burgdorferi, the bacterium responsible for Lyme disease. He developed a way to control gene expression in this pathogen with the overall goal of identifying possible vaccine targets for Lyme disease.

“We are hoping to increase the number of students who come to Montana Western to study biology and go on to biomedical careers, graduate or medical school,” Morrow said. “We need biomedical-minded students to work in our labs and help carry out our research.”

Congratulations to professors Morrow and Gilbert for helping put UM Western on the cutting edge of biomedical research!